RM Winter 2016 FLIP

10 / 88

Reading Matters
Research Matters
| 08| Reading Matters | Volume 16 • Winter 2016 |
note and asked him/her to describe the rain though the sense that
the desk cluster was assigned. Once they wrote on their sticky
notes, students placed it on the board under the appropriate
sense to create a chart that could serve as another example of a
prewriting strategy. Student examples included the following:
sight - tears, little streaks, waterfall, ice cubes, fog, blanket, drops,
and a watering can when you are watering plants; hearing - sh
sh sh sh, splat splat, drizzle drizzle, splash splash splash; smell -
salty, sweet, “sadness”whenever it rains I picture someone crying,
maybe angels; taste - water from a water hose, water; touch - It
feels like tiny tears in your hand, needles, softness, smooth. Then
the class collectively wrote the following using their new sense
prewriting chart: Rain looks like tears. It sounds like tapping. It smells
like sadness. Rain tastes like a glass of water. It feels like tickles on
your hand. As we closed the lesson, we discussed how using our
senses in writing enables us to share our experiences with others.
Lesson three: Editing
As noted previously, the students continued to work on
writing even on the days I was not in the classroom. As I prepared
for the next lesson, I realized that many students were ready for
and needed assistance with editing, so we made this the focus
of our third lesson. We discussed the purpose of editing for
publication and introduced proofreading marks. The teacher
made sure to mention that everyone has areas of needed
improvement, including adults, and even the best writers make
mistakes. To give students a tool for editing, we demonstrating
using proofreading marks for ideas such capitalizing words or
adding punctuation. As a class, students practiced editing a
journal entry using correction marks. Students then worked
in small groups to edit a very short play. During this lesson
I assisted a small group that needed step-by-step help and
scaffolding to complete the independent work. We closed
by again discussing the purpose of editing and explained
that good writers will edit their own work and can also seek
assistance from a peer to see if they find any more mistakes.
Lesson four: Revision
The results of our initial attitude survey indicated students’
serious reluctance to revise. Kittle (2003) explains that while
students may know that revision is a necessary part of writing,
they often resist it. To combat this resistance, we wanted to
provide students with concrete ideas on how to revise, as well as
model a strategy they would later use with their peers. We began
our fourth lesson by asking students to revise an informative
paragraph about the sun that they had written earlier in the
week with their teacher. We discussed what information in the
paragraph was fact and what was opinion. After they revised
independently, the teacher and I held individual conferences with
students using the two stars and a wish method (two positive
compliments and one thing to improve on) to revise their writing.
As I conferenced with students about their sun writing, I noticed
that students smiled when I gave them the two compliments and
eagerly went back to revise their writing after explaining what
to improve on. Each student returned to their desk with their
paper and a sticky note with the two stars and a wish critique.
Lesson Five: Further revision
Because we really wanted to emphasize revision, we focused
our next lesson on it as well. In this fifth lesson, the students helped
me revise a paragraph I had written about my favorite season,
emphasizing the use of descriptive words and giving reasons why
this was my favorite season. After revising, I showed students the
bubble map, something the students were familiar with, that I
created before composing my paragraph. Students then chose their
favorite season and created their own bubble map that included
reasons supporting why it was their favorite in the surrounding area.
We would eventually be developing this writing into our digital story.
We chose the topic of seasons because it was what the students
were studying in science. The teacher noticed that many students
enjoyed discussing the different seasons and thought it would be
a good topic that would support what students were learning in
both science and writing. At the end of the lesson, some students
shared what season they chose and a few reasons for their choice.
During the week, students continued working on their papers
and revised with peers using the two stars and a wish method.
Lesson six: Checklist
When I visited the class for the sixth time, I introduced a
checklist that I wanted students to use with a peer’s writing to
see if it contained all of the required components. The checklist
included the following questions: Does this writing focus on a
favorite season? Does the author explain why the season is his/
her favorite with at least three or more reasons? Does the author
use sensory (sight, hear, touch, smell, taste) words to describe the
season? Does the author use different sentence starters to make
exciting writing? Does the author use correct punctuation and
capitalization? STAR- Positive Comment: STAR- Positive Comment;
WISH- What To Improve. Many students were proud to see that they
had multiple parts of the checklist completed. Some students’faces
dropped when I said they might have to rewrite their paper before
publication, but I reminded them of our work toward publication.
Many other students were excited to share their writing. In
preparation for their digital story, students had drawn at least three
illustrations to go with their writing. One particular student was
proud to share a line that demonstrated how he used sensory words
in his writing to describe his favorite season summer:“I love the taste
of fresh fruits and vegetables especially sweet, juicy watermelon.”
At this point in the study, we were getting ready for publication
of their digital stories. While we were waiting for the iPads
to be delivered, the teacher and I worked together to make
sure each student had the following completed: revised and
edited final draft about their favorite season that contained
at least one sensory description (see, hear, taste, smell, touch)
and three or more pictures that connected to their writing.
Creating our Digital Stories
Each of the next four lessons was centered on helping
students move from the paper-pencil draft of their writing to a
digital story. There are many different applications teachers can
use for publishing digital stories, most of them free, depending